The 30 Day DDS Countdown: Why Your Timetable is Your Enemy After an Atlanta DUI

The 30 Day DDS Countdown: Why Your Timetable is Your Enemy After an Atlanta DUI

At the point that you are being released out of the Atlanta City Detention Center or a local county jail after being arrested on a DUI, the officer that arrested you probably gave you a sheet of paper of yellow color that he or she referred to as the DDS Form 1205. It is much more than a receipt of your arrest and it is a time bomb to your driving privileges.

A lot of motorists are of the wrong perception that their license can be secured until they find themselves in the criminal court before the judge. It is a false belief that is very dangerous. The arrest of DUI in Georgia results in two completely different legal proceedings, namely the criminal procedure in court, and the civil administrative one at the Department of Driver Services (DDS). In the case of the latter, your calendar is your ultimate nemesis.

The 30-Day Rule Explained

According to the Georgia law, you must use the 30 days following your arrest to act in order to save the driver license of your vehicle against an Administrative License Suspension (ALS). Unless you do so within this rigid 30-day period, your license will automatically enter into a 46-day hard suspension on the 46 th day following your arrest.

A hard suspension is what it implies, no driving whatsoever. This suspension may take up to 12 months to complete without the potential to use a restricted driving permit to drive to work, school or medical appointments depending on whether you have submitted to the chemical test of the state or not.

Your Two Choices to Halt the Clock.

You can usually take two strategic options before the 30 days run out in order to stop this automatic suspension:

Demand an Administrative License Suspension (ALS) Hearing.

This will be by paying a filing fee of 150 to the state and filing a formal written request to have the suspension appealed. ALS hearing will enable you to question the reasons why the officer has made the arrest and the suspension. Moreover, this administrative hearing will be tactfully exploited by a highly competent DUI Attorney Atlanta. It offers a golden chance to cross-examine the arresting officer under oath and confine his or her testimony months before even the actual criminal trial commences.

Use the Ignition Interlock Device Limited Permit (IIDLP).

Instead, you can decide to forego your right to a hearing and install an Ignition Interlock Device (IID) in your car depending on your driving history and depending on the circumstances of your case. You can resume driving instantly without being suspended without any hard suspension. Nevertheless, the device is very expensive to install and maintain, needs to be checked monthly, and you have to keep it in your car during a year.

Why Waiting is the Greatest Mistake.

The 30 days deadline is not relative and cannot be forgiven. The Department of Driver Services will not give extensions to you on the grounds that you were traveling, you lost the yellow form, and you merely did not understand the legal lingo. As soon as the 30th day ends at midnight, the period of appeal is lost forever.

This is precisely the reason as to why waiting until you get the court date on a postage envelope before you hire a DUI Lawyer Atlanta is one of the worst mistakes that a driver can ever make. It could take several months before you are put on trial on your criminal charges but the DDS time to suspend begins as soon as the handcuffs are fastened.

Guaranteeing Your Driving Rights.

To balance between an ALS hearing and an IIDLP, one needs to have a thorough knowledge of the tricky and very tricky traffic laws in Georgia and the long-term perspective of how the civil suspension will interplay with your criminal pending. What you can do wrongly and fail to do can greatly affect your livelihood, family and freedom.

When you are having this inflexible deadline and must obtain your driving rights, James Yeargan can be trusted as an Atlanta based DUI attorney. He realizes how serious the 30-day DDS countdown is, time-sensitive and can appeal on your behalf instantly to block the automatic suspension of your license as he constructs a strong case on your criminal case.